Off Day

I suppose there is not much to say today as well. I am about to type out my thoughts for my lesson (as I said I hoped to do today...).
I have been pondering a lot lately (based on reading the book A Praying Life by Paul Miller) about the relational nature of prayer. It has been a tremendously freeing thought, because much of my prayers over the past several months have been constrained to "prayer time." "Prayer time" is time that I get to spend alone with God. Whenever a streamer thought would pop up--"Hey, I should pray about this"--I would respond "Yes, at prayer time...."
Of course, in a house with 3 children under 10, and having to get up at 3:15 am to be at work, there is hardly ever a moment where it is "quiet" in our house. This makes it really easy to push prayer time back, further and further, until it doesn't happen at all for the day.
That's the main thing that this book shattered for me--the "prayer time" myth.
Don't get me wrong, there is a definite need to pray at specific times of day--time set aside specifically to pray. However, when this is becomes the only time we pray, it cuts off the relationship nature of prayer.
God is our Heavenly Father, "Our Father" according to Jesus in the Lord's Prayer. When we isolate the time that we speak to Him to just the set aside portions of "prayer time", it severs us from the relationship we have with God. Relationships thrive on communication, and I think this is meant to be a picture of our relationship with God. Prayer needs to be made up of both times of longer periods of prayer, and shorter communication prayers. This is how we can speak to God, and we can hear His voice to us in the Scriptures.
I think I might have to draw this out into tomorrow's post too (because I have to work on my notes now...). Stay tuned for part 2, hopefully tomorrow.